With the Dragon capsule now safely in orbit, a SpaceX official confirmed that the ashes of a few hundred people went along on the Falcon 9 rocket. One whose remains were on board is Gordon Cooper, one of the original U.S. astronauts. Another is James Doohan, the beloved Scotty from “Star Trek.”

About the blogger

Related Blog Posts

Doohan had an interesting back story. Like Shatner, he was a Canadian. He was a WW II vet who was in the D-Day landings in France. Like the character he played, he was a tough old bird: he survived being hit six times by a machine gun (a case of “friendly fire”), one bullet took one of fingers (they hid this during the show). He went from infantry officer to pilot, eventually learning how to fly a jet. Bob Collins would have liked this guy…